by J. C. Nelson
“I heard a rat. Did you lay the salt outside my door?”
He nodded and handed the Deliverator to Aunt Emelia. “Is the crawl space hatch in the back bedroom nailed shut?”
She shook her head.
“Good. I’m going under the house to see what it is. Put that in the gun safe?” He didn’t wait, sprinting down the hall toward the bedrooms.
Aunt Emelia walked over to the kitchen and deposited the Deliverator on the counter. Then she took out a bottle of bourbon and poured a shot. “Here, you look like a mess. I’m sorry, we work to keep our boundaries up so the house is safe. One day with the boy home and there’s already a damned meat-skin under the house. Probably just a spare, nothing big.”
I shook my head. “Drinking on the job is strictly prohibited.”
From under our feet, Brynner shouted a muffled rant of curses, then the floor shook as something slammed into it.
I took the shot glass and downed it, gagging as the burning warmth hit me. “I’m sick of hearing meat-skins and shamblers and walkers and spares. I’m good at translating, I’m not used to this.”
She refilled it from the bottle. “Don’t you worry. There isn’t one field operative alive who didn’t start out confused and scared. Scared is fine. It keeps you alive. Confusion we can help with, once the boy gets back.”
Brynner returned, wearing cobwebs, dust, and a scowl. “There’s a gap in the barriers five inches wide by the back porch. I’ll get some salt and fill it in. Want to see our uninvited visitor?”
I hadn’t drunk nearly enough alcohol to prepare me for what he held up. In his grasp, a severed hand writhed, fingers clawing back and forth. He waved to me with it. “Say hello to your admirer, Grace. He’s not much to look at but can be handy in a pinch. I’ll be back once I’ve disposed of him.” He turned toward the kitchen and made it nearly two steps before a sharp whistle made him stop, and me take another gulp of liquid fire.
Aunt Emelia put her hands on her hips. “Boy, what have I told you about burning the dead in my good oven?”
Brynner froze, his shoulders hunched, and looked at the floor. “Not to. I’ll use the grill out back. Don’t worry, Grace, this one won’t be making any more trouble.”
I downed another glass and held it up for a refill.
By the time Brynner came into the living room, the sun had tipped downward and the bourbon had me warmer than the evening chill could touch. He’d showered and changed into a cotton shirt that stretched nicely over his frame.
The front door swung open and Bran bustled in, a pizza box in hand. “How’s my favorite woman in the world?”
Emelia shook her head. “We had an incident while Grace was working. Nothing major. Be a dear and put that Deliverator away.”
Bran took the gun off the table and gave me a thumbs-up. “Did you get it? Was it a big one?”
His question hung in the air unanswered. Which was answer enough.
Aunt Emelia lit the fireplace, and when it roared and popped, she plunked me down on the couch in front of it. “Boy, get your father’s manuals. You have work to do.”
And if it weren’t for the never-ending bourbon in my hand, I’d have died of embarrassment at the thought of him schooling me. Brynner left and returned with a leather binder the size of an encyclopedia. Inside, hand-drawn sketches of co-orgs filled the pages, with a dizzying array of names.
The BSI version I received in mandatory training showed simple naked corpses. The drawings decorating Brynner’s book would give me nightmares for months.
He sat beside me, making me feel like a schoolgirl studying— or not studying, as the case had been. “The Re-Animus have plagued us since at least the Middle Kingdom of Egypt. Dad thought they were evil spirits, maybe just one, maybe a whole legion. Grandpa van Helsing swore they weren’t demons, because he’d personally killed the last demon. Truth is, we don’t know, but what we do know is that they live through other bodies.” He flipped over a page. “This here, this is your average meat-skin. Some poor schmuck dead for a few days, grabbed by the Re-Animus just for fun. The body gets pushed around for a few hours to maybe kill a few people, and then dropped like a rock. We see these every freaking day in the field.”
He turned the page, and I slumped over next to him, letting the bourbon and his warmth spread through me. He caught his breath. Nice to know I still could have that effect on someone. “This is a shambler. If the Re-Animus spends enough time in a body, it starts changing, becoming stronger, and faster. When the Re-Animus moves on, the body will keep moving. It’ll do whatever comes to what’s left of its mind. Not intelligent, but plenty dangerous. The police won’t even shoot at them, because it might bring them running.”
He leafed over a few pages. Various body parts drawn in painful detail decorated it. “Here’s your friend. A Re-Animus doesn’t need a whole body. It can take a spare part or two and use it, though what one would do with a severed foot, I can’t really say. In Egypt I heard tell of ears and noses being animated, so go figure.”
In the middle of this madness, it almost made sense. A spare part, scratching around under the floor. On and on it went. Page after page of corpses that walked, and mummies, drawings of Re-Animus that made them look like clouds of evil, pages of folk charms.
The list of things that wouldn’t kill a Re-Animus would be shorter than the items Heinrich Carson said did. Salt for the foundations to keep them out, pine stakes to sap their strength, amber to poison them, alabaster to prevent them healing.
Brynner’s tone said he believed it, every last bit. Why not? It worked, for him. He reached his arm around me, and the bourbon in me smiled at him. He smiled back for a moment, then frowned. “Did my aunt give you something to calm your nerves?”
I nodded. Wasn’t it obvious from how I wasn’t challenging any of his assertions? Or the way I gave in so easily to the urge to cuddle with him? Oh, if there were a god, I’d have him make a man for me just like Brynner, only one I could keep to myself.
Like that, the charm on his face swept away. Brynner pulled his arm back and pushed me upright. “How many nerves did you need calmed?” He took the drink from my hand and set it aside. “It’s time for you to get to sleep.”
BRYNNER
I thought about the first time I met a co-org. Dad brought it home in a box and locked me in the room with it and a hatchet until I took care of business. I didn’t sleep for a week afterward. Grace, on the other hand, needed to sleep for a dozen hours at least.
She struggled up and off the couch, heading for the door. I snagged her hand. “Whoa, you aren’t going anywhere. I’ll make up the couch. Or you can have my bed and I’ll sleep on the couch.”
Grace rubbed one eye with her fist. “I’m going back to my motel room. I’m not going to be another woman who got drunk and spent the night in your bed.”
That stung. I didn’t need or want drunk women. If a woman couldn’t say she wanted me and for certain, I’d find another friend for the night. And in case she hadn’t heard, work women were at least somewhat strictly off-limits.
I looked to my aunt. “Give me a hand?”
She shook her head. “You don’t have any right to keep her here. If you don’t want her driving and she won’t stay, take her back to her motel.” She didn’t need to remind me to behave.
“You win.” With one hand under Grace’s arm and the other under her legs, I half carried, half dragged Grace to the truck. She sang most of the way home, a horrible rendition of “Friends in Low Places” that made it clear why she took up translating for a living instead of singing.
I left the truck running while I grabbed a spare key to Grace’s room, then dragged her in, flopping her on the bed. One quick perimeter, closet, and under-the-bed check later, she was ready to go night-night, so far out of it that she was practically in another state.
The desert wind whipped a stubby mesquite outside, and the branches scratched the window.
Grace froze, her eyes wide.
“It’s okay. Just
the wind.” I’d known how to tell the difference between corpses at the door and scratchy tree branches when I was ten.
“Don’t leave me.” Grace’s voice took on the high pitch of hysteria as she took off her shirt to reveal a cream-colored bra. She wore her curves well, and if it weren’t for the alcohol, it would be an offer worth taking.
“Sorry, but we both need sleep. Some other night?”
She lurched forward, seizing my arm so her fingernails cut into me. “What if it something comes? Stay. I won’t tell anyone.”
I closed my eyes as she continued to strip, turned away, then ran to grab a trash can. Given how much liquor she’d drunk, her stomach would stage a revolt eventually.
When I returned with the can, Grace had passed out, her arm falling off the bed. One breast peeked from under the covers, a flash of white flesh and dark nipple. I’d heard chainsaws quieter than her snoring. I left her there, locking the door behind me. I needed to hit the bar in Eaton. Find some company to take out the fire Grace lit in me.
But I couldn’t drive away, any more than I could stay in her room. Taking a box of rock salt, I reapplied her barrier, then pushed through the brush, adding salt to both side windows. Grace was safe.
I could go home and sleep in a bed, but she’d asked me to stay.
God help me, I wanted to.
After returning the spare key to the office, I went back to the truck and unrolled my bamboo mat in the truck bed along with the foil blanket I kept for emergencies. With my coat pulled down over me, I closed my eyes and dozed.
Through the night, I startled awake from time to time, certain I’d heard something moving. Each time, I got out and searched the brush, and each time, climbed back into the truck without so much as a desert hare to show for it.
Grace’s door stayed closed, and so I remained until the sun came up.
I woke with my cell phone ringing and a crick in my back that made it hard to breathe, rolled over, and unlocked my phone. “Brynner Carson speaking.”
“Brynner, where is my translator? I’ve been trying to reach her all morning.” Director Bismuth’s crisp New England accent shook the cobwebs from my brain.
The whole truth included several inconvenient situations for Grace. “She’s asleep in her room.”
She hissed into the phone, “Your aunt tells me you drove Ms. Roberts back to her motel after an incident, and that you didn’t come home. What exactly were you thinking, spending the night with her? What have I told you about work women?”
I threw back my head in frustration, and a burst of pain from muscles I didn’t know I had rewarded me, breaking any illusion of patience I had. “Look, I drove Grace back to keep her from driving. And turned her down when she asked me to stay.”
She paused for a moment. “Lies are unbecoming of you, Brynner. You are known for many things, but restraint is not one of them. Your father would never have acted in such a manner. When are you going to live up to his legacy?”
Stunned, almost unable to answer, I whispered, “I’ll try to wake her up.” With my muscles aching, I rolled out of the truck bed and banged on her door so hard the windows rattled.
After a couple of minutes, Grace surfaced, withering under the dawn sunlight like a vampire. She had a bedspread wrapped around her and dark circles under her eyes. “What do you want?”
I held out the phone. “You to answer your phone. It’s Director Bismuth.” I didn’t wait for her answer. I ran to the truck and drove, but not back to my aunt and uncle’s house.
Instead, I headed to the cemetery, looking for the only person who might ever have understood how I felt.
The Bentonville cemetery stretched out into the desert, carefully clipped prickly pears and cacti providing green among the brown. I knew where I was going, waving to the caretaker, who dropped his rake and followed me.
I didn’t intend to dig anyone up today. I just wanted to talk. I wasn’t there when my aunt chose the tombstone, because to be there I’d have to let go of the anger I’d nursed so carefully. Coming to his funeral would have meant accepting his choices.
His grave stood out among the others, the mounds of white salt making Dad’s grave like his life: a barren place where nothing else could grow.
And I couldn’t find the words I wanted at first, so I stood in silence, until the unfairness of the situation bubbled out. But what came out wasn’t what I went to complain about. I’d finally found a voice for the question I always wanted to ask him. “Why did you leave me there?”
Dad didn’t answer any more now than all the times I asked when he was alive.
“It’s not that they didn’t love me. I wanted to be with you. You weren’t ever going to be able to bring Mom back.” I looked over at the grave next to his. “Lara Carson,” read the headstone. It lied.
“I do everything you taught me. I kill anything that ought to be dead. And it won’t ever be enough.” Tears coursed down my face, making the world blurry. “I’ve got scars on my scars. I’ve broken every bone in my body twice. I’m sick of this. I’m not you. I don’t know if I can do it anymore.”
After a silence as long as all the conversations we’d had in the past, I turned to leave.
Aunt Emelia stood, watching me. She came every day, laying flowers by Mom’s grave, and I guess Dad’s.
I knew she’d heard my outburst. “I’m sorry.”
The tears on her cheeks matched mine, but instead of scowling at me, she looked on me with compassion. “Don’t be, boy. That’s been a long time coming.”
I walked toward her, when what I wanted to do was run away the same way Dad did. “I didn’t do anything with Grace. I slept in the truck. I don’t know why the director—” I did know. Not like I hadn’t earned her expectations.
She nodded, her face glistening. “I tried to explain to Maggie this morning.”
“If she calls again, I need you to give her a message.” I’d never been so certain about anything in my life.
I walked to the truck and didn’t look back. “Tell her I quit.”
Eleven
GRACE
I woke with a headache like someone playing the bongo drum on my skull, and a memory of asking Brynner to stay. That would be my last foray into bourbon for at least a decade. For one moment, I panicked, incapable of remembering exactly how he’d answered my request.
If he’d stayed with me, he wouldn’t have been outside, pounding on the door so hard it rattled the windows. Knowing men, he wouldn’t have been angry. Smug or sleepy, but not angry.
That was it—I’d asked him to stay because the thought of one of those co-orgs clawing at the door, waiting for me to open it, made me sick to my stomach. It was one thing to see them safely trapped behind glass, razor-sharp fingernails and teeth removed.
Another entirely to be inches from one in the wild.
I should have expected the director’s call, wanting to know how my first day of translation went.
After Brynner left, I’d given her a rundown of the organization issues, and my attempts to sort the journals by age. Thankfully she accepted it and let me go. Which kept me from telling her the truth.
How did it go?
Horrible.
I’d nearly shot a man, drank on the job, tried to drive drunk, and invited a coworker with a reputation into my bed. Because without a doubt, that’s where I’d have had him stay. While I couldn’t be certain, I had a nagging feeling I’d been planning on finding out if the stories about Brynner were true. Like I hadn’t learned that lesson already.
I needed another shot at those journals. I needed this job to last at least a month. One month of field pay and the days of my phone’s constant ringing would fade. Two months, and I might have a shot at catching up.
But first I needed to apologize.
For nearly shooting him. For getting completely drunk and trying to drive. If he were gracious, maybe he’d let me skip on an apology about the motel. The part of my heart I didn’t like listening to insisted
he would be.
When I exited the motel room, I ran into my next major issue.
I’d left my car back at Brynner’s house. So I walked down to the office, rousing the attendant from his sleep. “Can you give me the number for Bran and Emelia Homer? Brynner drove me home last night, and I need to get back to my car.”
“That didn’t take long.” The attendant chuckled to himself as he jotted down a phone number and handed it to me.
Only the intervening counter kept me from kicking him in the shin. Instead, I went out to make a call. When Aunt Emelia answered, I wasn’t sure what to say. “Hello? This is Grace—”
“Oh, honey. You left your car at our house. I’m out at the cemetery. I’ll be over in twenty to pick you up.” She hung up.
I went back to the line of salt Brynner poured out by my doorstep. The urge to kick it came in waves. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. The thought of those things outside my door made me want to vomit.
So instead I sat on the concrete, wondering what sort of world this was, where people did things for each other. Certainly not one I’d lived in. My kind of people left when you needed them most, if they were ever there to begin with.
Emelia pulled up twenty minutes later on the dot, rolling down the window of her Japanese coupe so I could unlock the passenger door. “You sleep well?”
I shook my head. “I don’t normally drink. Or try to shoot people. Or drive after drinking and trying to shoot people.”
She waved her hand like my problems were mosquitoes to shoo away. “You aren’t the first person to need a little Southern comfort after their first run-in with a meat-skin.”
When we got home, Bran sat on the porch, waiting. Emelia didn’t seem the least bit surprised to see him there on a weekday. She waved to me. “You best come on inside.”
My fears went from vapor to rock solid. “Did something happen to Brynner? Was it because of last night? Was it because of this morning?”
“Neither. Both.” Bran stood up and waved me over. “The boy’s decided to take some time off. You’ll need to contact the field commander and let them know.”